


The Trial

by EllanaSan



Series: Have a Drink Sweetheart (Hayffie Prompts/one shots collection) [41]
Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: A - Freeform, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Book 3: Mockingjay, F/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-15 07:15:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28809459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllanaSan/pseuds/EllanaSan
Summary: They come one morning while she is doing her physical therapy.Rebel soldiers invade her hospital room with their guns and their grim faces and they bark at her that she’s under arrest.
Relationships: Haymitch Abernathy/Effie Trinket
Series: Have a Drink Sweetheart (Hayffie Prompts/one shots collection) [41]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/71774
Comments: 8
Kudos: 64





	The Trial

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Could you please fuck me up and write a fic where after effies rescued from the Capitol, coin gets so far into her purge and effie actually ends up on trail as a Capitol citizen involved in the games (which is obviously set up to find her guilty and have her executed) and its only at the last minute where it’s looking like coin will get her way when Plutarch and haymitch manage to get effie immunity?

They come one morning while she is doing her physical therapy.

Rebel soldiers invade her hospital room with their guns and their grim faces and they bark at her that she’s under arrest.

She doesn’t really listen to the list of crimes, she doesn’t even resist when they handcuff her hands behind her back despite the nurse’s flustered warnings that she is hurt and that, _surely_ , there _must_ have been a mistake because she has been enjoying VIP status for weeks now and…

Effie doesn’t really care.

A part of her always knew it would end that way.

Grey uniforms… White uniforms…

It all swells and sways in her vision and she cannot really tell anymore if she’s still in the hospital or back in the street where the Peacekeepers arrested her.

Does it matter anyway?

°O°O°O°O°

She’s forced in a paper thin white outfit of matching pants and tank top and it looks so much like what they made them wear down in the cell that the only thing she can hang on to to remember it’s all over is that it is still pristine and not yet bloodied.

°O°O°O°O°

Someone who must be a higher ranking officer – whatever it means in a rebel army – shows up a little while after and tells her she’s allowed legal representation for her upcoming trial.

The trial, she comes to understand through the haze in her head, will come quick.

A part of her cannot help but be relieved by that.

She’s barely _there_ in her own mind.

She can barely cling to reality.

She gives them the name of her lawyer, careful to be polite because talking back only leads to being hurt in her experience, and she sinks in a corner of her cell, losing herself in her head like Haymitch has been begging her not to do since she finally woke up in that hospital room.

°O°O°O°O°

It’s possible her mind drifts far from sanity again.

°O°O°O°O°

The man who comes to see her is not her lawyer.

She cannot say if it is the same night or the next day or even a month later.

She cannot say anything because, in her head, she is not in that relatively nice cell but in a much smaller one and her body hurts and her shoulder isn’t the only thing that is aching.

The man is young and nervous and his hair has been dyed black so hastily that some strands remained purple and that it shows at the roots. The rebels are already erasing the Capitol’s bright colors she muses, painting it over with their washed out grey and their harsh black and their bland white…

He explains that her lawyer is dead and that he has been appointed as her official representation instead. He fusses for a whole minute about where to sit before finally taking a seat on the bare bed since she is still huddling in the corner and does not seem willing to move to properly greet him.

There’s something so desperate and yet blasé about the way he opens his folder and starts talking about a possible line of defense that, even through the haze, Effie knows she’s not the first client in that particular row of cells and that none of them have been particularly lucky.

She doesn’t really answer his questions and, after a while, he simply stops trying.

He’s not unsympathetic.

If anything, she thinks, he looks horrified deep down.

He cannot be older than Finnick, she muses, and then she remembers Finnick is dead and she just closes her eyes and rests her head against the wall.

“It will be very quick.” the young man tells her, sounding very sorry but also a little desperate to comfort her. “I… It _always_ goes very quickly. They do it right after the sentencing.”

He doesn’t say what it is _they do_ but she doesn’t need to ask.

She can take a wild guess.

°O°O°O°O°

She wonders _how_ they will do it though.

If it will be painful.

If it will be quick as promised.

She supposes it means a firing squad and, somehow, that seems fitting. Not worse than anything else she has been through so far. Surely she can face a firing squad with whatever dignity she has left to scrape.

°O°O°O°O°

She startles awake to the sound of heels and a woman she vaguely recognizes ordering a guard to open her cell.

She’s confused for a second because the woman is a high-profile hotshot lawyer, very good if rumor is to be trusted, one of those _fixers_ that can make a _situation_ disappear, be it legally or through more shady means.

She’s beautiful and that comforts Effie a little - _that_ surprises her; she didn’t know she still cared about beauty.

The woman is wearing all white, the suit lines simple but striking against her dark skin, and there is a spark in her eyes as if she particularly enjoys the challenge Effie poses.

“I thought the young lawyer…” Effie croaks out, forcing herself to be coherent, _lucid_.

“Mr Abernathy and Mr Heavensbee hired me.” the woman replied. “First thing first. I have obtained that your court date be pushed back, a nurse will be in to see to your shoulder today and you need to be prepared to give the performance of a lifetime.”

°O°O°O°O°

The whole plan, it turns out, is to make her look like a victim.

Victim of her naivety.

Victim of circumstances.

Victim of her feelings.

Victim of the Capitol.

Victim of everything.

All of that might be true but there is one thing Effie is really not good at playing and it is a victim.

Too much pride.

Too much ego.

It surprises her that she has both still.

°O°O°O°O°

Effie loses count of the days.

A nurse comes in once every afternoon and the physical therapy resumes.

She almost wishes it wouldn’t.

Her shoulder aches badly and the surgery has only made it worse, it seems. The exercises are torture and the reminder that if she doesn’t apply herself she might never gain back her range of movement aren’t that convincing. What does she care about her range of movement if she’s going to be shot soon?

Sometimes, her hotshot lawyer waltzes in and Effie stares and doesn’t even care how rude it is because the woman is beautiful and, as it turns out, she really _does_ still love beauty. She is, in fact, _starved_ for it.

The court date is pushed back.

It’s pushed back again.

_And again_.

°O°O°O°O°

“We are negotiating with President Coin directly.” the lawyer tells her every time. “Hopefully, we won’t have to go to actual court.”

°O°O°O°O°

Sometimes, the guard marches someone past her cell.

Familiar faces.

Gamemakers, escorts, stylists, people from prep teams, people from staff…

They never return.

She doesn’t lie to herself and hope they have been acquitted.

°O°O°O°O°

She does not hope as a general rule.

She used to be very good at it but now…

°O°O°O°O°

“You need to stay positive, Effie. We are making progress.” her lawyer promises.

She doesn’t believe her.

She knows Haymitch and Plutarch are negotiating but she also knows President Coin – whoever that woman is – won’t release her unless she has something huge to gain in the bargain. Presidents are never selfless and, from what she heard, it doesn’t sound like Coin is very sweet on Haymitch anyway.

°O°O°O°O°

One day her lawyer appears and she doesn’t radiate her usual confidence. There is no spring in her steps, no arrogant tilt to her chin…

“They set a new court date for this afternoon.” the woman announces bluntly. “It seems like… It does not seem like it will be pushed back this time.”

It takes a few moments for what it truly means to sink in but, eventually, Effie nods.

She wonders if her relief is obvious.

Better dead than trapped in a cell again.

Better dead than anything but _free_.

“Haymitch is still trying.” the woman says and Effie nods again. “He wants you to know.”

She wishes she knew what to say to that, magic words that she could ask the woman to pass along for her, words that would soothe his inevitable grief. She’s loathed to pile on that what’s with all the dead friends.

But she’s more relieved than anything else.

And she doesn’t have the words anyway.

°O°O°O°O°

Soldiers drag her to an elevator and out in the open through a back alley, her lawyer protesting the rough treatment all the way.

There’s a truck and she’s about to be carelessly flung into it when a cry alerts the soldiers.

Guns flare up.

For a second, the only thing Effie sees is Haymitch at the end of the alley flailing his arms to attract their attention, about to get shot, and she thinks he’s stupid enough to _actually_ try and break her out.

Then she realizes Plutarch is behind him and there are papers in his hands and the lawyer looks suddenly very relieved.

What happens next, she cannot really say because her ears are ringing and her shoulder is hurting and everyone is talking at the same time.

Someone eventually undoes her handcuffs and, without really meaning to, she collapses against Haymitch who seems to mistake that for a hug and embraces her tight. His cold nose is pressed against her neck, his strong hand coils at the back of her nape…

“I’ve got you. It’s over now.” he whispers again and again but she thinks it’s to comfort himself more than it is for her sake. “I’ve got you, sweetheart. It’s over.”

She clings back to him as much as she can despite the shoulder and her tricky hazy mind that wants to send her railing into bad memories.

“I want to go home.” she mumbles.

“Yes.” he says immediately, shrugging off his coat to wrap it around her. “Let’s go.”

He’s steered her all the way out of the alley when she realizes she doesn’t know where _home_ is anymore. Her apartment is not currently livable, she doesn’t want to go back to the hospital, nobody wants to tell her what happened to her family and Haymitch doesn’t own any property in the city…

And yet, as she leans against his side and lets him support her and drop random kisses in her dirty hair, she realizes that, maybe, it doesn’t really matter.

Haymitch will keep her safe.

That’s all that matters for now.

Perhaps that feeling can be _home_ for now.

**Author's Note:**

> If you think the lawyer looks like Olivia Pope it's because she was directly inspired by her lmao. Well... early seasons her. I've been in a mood for early seasons Scandal. Anyway... I hope you enjoyed this! Let me know your thoughts!


End file.
